Description:
Scalloped-top chest of drawers on frame in cherry with white pine. The scalloped top concept, which begain in Wethersfield, Connecticut in the 1750s, migrated up the Connecticut River Valley to the Northampton-Hatfield-Deerfield region of western Massachusetts, where other variants in this "style" were made into the first years of the nineteenth century. Three of these chests have their origins in Deerfield. According to family tradition, David Hoyt (1722-1814), who lived in the Old Indian House, gave scalloped-top chests to his daughters, Persis, Mercy, and Mary, upon their marriages; since the legacy to sons exceeded the patriomony extended to daughters, fathers corrected the imbalance to some degree with expensive furniture. This chest, the last of the three commissioned probably from Benjamin Munn III (1738-1824), was given to Mary Hoyt (1760-1821) who married Dr. William Stoddard Williams (1762-1829) in 1786, descended in the Williams and Fuller families until it was given to Historic Deerfield by Miss Elizabeth Fuller (1896-1979), daughter of George Spencer Fuller and Mary Williams (Field) Fuller of Deerfield. The chest given to Persis (1747-1830), who married John Sheldon IV (1739-1806) in 1769, descended in the Shelton family and is now in the Memorial Hall Museum; the chest given to Mercy (1755-1834), who married the Deerfield hatter Justin Hitchcock (1752-1822) in 1779, descended in the family until it entered a private collection in the 1970s. The top, which is deeply scalloped on the front and sides, is over four graduated, molded-edge drawers; the brasses are not original. The frame has a molded top, triple flattened-arch skirt, and short cabriole legs ending in delicate pointed, ribbed feet. This chest and a similar chest in the collection (76.050), are the only scalloped-top chests known that do not have a central drawer with a carved fan, and are also the only ones with pointed slipper feet. The top drawer front is cherry and the drawer bottoms are white pine.
Label Text:
From the 1750s to the 1820s, western Massachusetts families commissioned regionally distinctive furniture, such as this scallop-top chest-on-frame, as wedding gifts. According to family tradition, Deerfield tavern-keeper and farmer, David Hoyt (1722-1814), gave scalloped-top chests as wedding presents to each of his three daughters, Persis (1747-1830) married in 1769, Mercy (1755-1834) married in 1779, and Mary (1760-1821) who received this chest when she married Dr. William Stoddard Williams (1762-1829) in 1786.
Link to share this object record:
https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+54.017 |
